Paris (AFP)

Parliament on Tuesday approved the introduction of a "neighboring right" to copyright for agencies and press publishers, a reform designed to rebalance their relationship with digital giants like Google or Facebook.

This bill, passed by 81 votes to one, in a final vote of the Assembly, is the first transcription, in national legislation, of Article 15 (ex-11) of the European Law Directive. author, approved at the end of March by the European Parliament.

"We can be proud to be the first country in Europe", welcomed the Minister of Culture Franck Riester, who had welcomed a "text absolutely essential for our democracy and the survival of an independent and free press" .

"The Assembly was able to gather to show the GAFA that in a democracy, the press is not a product like the others," added the rapporteur Patrick Mignola (MoDem).

The creation of a "neighboring right" should allow the media, such as Agence France-Presse (AFP), to be better paid when online reuse of their production by aggregators of information, such as Google News, or social networks like Facebook.

However, the adopted text excludes "hyperlinks, isolated words and very short excerpts from a press publication" from the scope of the protection of neighboring rights, the duration of which is fixed at two years, in accordance with the Directive European.

The adoption of this bill, initiated by Senator David Assouline (PS), paves the way for negotiations on, among other things, the basis and modalities of remuneration, or the choice of the company responsible for collecting and management of the funds.

"The amount of the remuneration (...) will have to take into account elements such as the human, material and financial investments made" by the publishers and agencies, as well as "their contribution to the political and general information", specifies the text that intends to favor quality rather than audience.

Professional journalists and other authors of published works (including photographs and videos) will also be entitled to "an appropriate and fair share" of remuneration, says the bill.

- "Plundered by the GAFA" -

"This is the culmination of a long work that we carry for three years," said AFP Florence Braka, executive director of the French Federation of News Agencies, which notes that "information is expensive to produce and the contents, especially the photos, are looted via the platforms ".

"This will help rebalance value in a sector that is vital to democracy," she said, supporting media that produce "quality and verified information."

For Bruno Hocquart de Turtot, representative of the Alliance of the political and general information press, which gathers most of the titles of the written press (except magazines), "the work of the publishers of the press and the journalists will be finally paid instead of being gleefully looted by the GAFA "(Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon).

For its part, the Association of Community Internet Services (ASIC) which counts Google and Facebook among its members, said in a statement the "exceptions" enshrined by Parliament, "protecting the free flow of information and free choice publishers and digital players ".

She was also pleased that "despite the fears, the law does not create a systematic payment obligation for each hypertext link", but regretted that it "did not clarify" what is meant by + very short excerpts + from a press release ".

Questioning "the perimeter of application of the law", she also asked "if contents that would not be political and general information" enter or not "within the scope of the new law", and even "s 'they would be legitimate to receive remuneration'.

EU member states have until 17 April 2021 to transpose the European Copyright Directive into their national legislation.

© 2019 AFP